


Aunt Violet. In the Library. With a Mobile Phone.

by Draycevixen



Series: Meet the Holmes family [3]
Category: Person of Interest (TV), Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Crack, Crossover, Humour, M/M, Meet the Family, Pining, Pre-Relationship, Pre-Slash, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-15
Updated: 2012-04-15
Packaged: 2017-11-03 17:29:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/384033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Draycevixen/pseuds/Draycevixen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A sequel to <i>An Englishman in Coney Island.</i></p><p>Reese gets to meet Finch's relatives. </p><p>Again, for Togsos. Get well soon, petal.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aunt Violet. In the Library. With a Mobile Phone.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [togsos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/togsos/gifts).



.

Their latest number had been rough; circus clowns weren’t funny when they were trying to kill you. All he wanted to do was go back to his crummy apartment, shower until he ran out of hot water and then fall face first in to bed until Finch called about the next number. There was no denying that he was exhausted and running on fumes but he still couldn’t understand why he was hallucinating. 

He blinked a couple of more times and looked again. No, she was still standing in the doorway, a tall, slender, older woman with a chic bob of brunette curls slightly greying at the temples. Dressed in a classic Chanel suit, handmade Italian heels and carrying a large black Hermès handbag, she embodied understated elegance. His knowledge of haute couture would probably surprise Finch but the CIA considered such knowledge useful. 

How had she made it in to the library, past Finch’s security system, without their knowing? 

“Perhaps you might be of help to me; I am looking for Harold Finch.” 

Her accent was upper class English, identifying it easily another legacy of CIA training. As her hand disappeared in to her cavernous handbag he saw a flash of black metal. He had his gun drawn and pointed at her before she could hope to finish reaching for hers. 

“Don’t move.” 

The fact that she didn’t look scared, only annoyed, at having a gun pointed at her confirmed his suspicion that she was a consummate professional, one with superb camouflage. 

“John, _no!_ ” Finch had appeared at his side from out of the book stacks. Finch pushed down on his gun arm, stepping forward between the two of them. 

“Finch, don’t be fooled, she’s obviously—”

“My aunt.”

“What?” Perhaps he wasn’t hallucinating but instead was already in his apartment asleep and dreaming. She _was_ very attractive, with high cheekbones and only the faintest of laugh lines around her eyes, but she wasn’t the usual fodder of his late night fantasies and certainly wasn’t whom they’d featured lately. 

“Good afternoon, Aunt Violet. This is such an unexpected pleasure.”

“Harold, at last.” She kissed Finch lightly on the cheek. “I do believe your man—”

“Mr. Reese, Aunt.” He had never seen Finch blush before. “Mrs. Violet Holmes, may I introduce Mr. John Reese?”

Reese wondered if he was supposed to bow. 

“Your Mr. Reese was going to shoot me for the grievous sin of owning a mobile phone.” She reached in to her handbag and pulled out her phone waggling it before dropping it back in to her bag. 

“I’m sorry, ma’am, we don’t usually have visitors.” He tried his best to look contrite.

“He is polite at least.” 

She crossed the room to Finch’s desk, dragging her fingers lightly across the top of a computer monitor before rubbing them together lightly obviously checking for dust. 

“I am disappointed, Harold.”

“Aunt?” 

Reese had, however, seen Finch look panicked before. 

“I was expecting something more in the spirit of the Fortress of Solitude.”

“ _Superman?_ ” He didn’t realize he’d said it out loud until both Finch and his Aunt Violet turned synchronized raised eyebrows loose on him. 

“Would you prefer the Batcave, Mr. Reese? No need to look so surprised, I too was once a child.” 

He suspected that might be a lie and that she was really a pod person... He really needed to get some sleep and to stop watching old movies on late night TV. 

She paced the room inspecting the premises, her back ramrod straight, her posture perfect, and he had to fight the army instilled urge to snap to attention. 

“Now I come to think of it, Harold, you could be a Robin as easily as a Finch and that would make your Mr. Reese the Batman.” She stopped in front of him tilting her head, looking him over briefly from head to toe; she had the most extraordinary pale grey eyes. “I have no doubt he would look good in tights.” 

“Mummy! I asked you to wait for me.” 

Reese couldn’t believe that yet another person had just walked in to the room without his noticing. He would blame it, yet again, on being exhausted but suspected it was just the effect Finch’s aunt always had on people. 

It was the man who’d met with Finch at the aquarium. “Your tailor is your cousin?” 

Aunt Violet cupped Reese’s chin, ignoring his flinch and turned his head so she could study his profile and then turned it back. “He is awfully pretty, Harold...” she released his chin, only to pat his cheek lightly “...though obviously not terribly bright.” 

She crossed the room to take Finch’s arm which was automatically offered to her the moment she touched his elbow. 

“Mr. Reese, if you will please excuse us; Harold, I would like a word with you in private.” She led Finch off in to the book stacks. 

Reese took a seat on the edge of the desk, slouching, legs casually crossed at the ankle. “So you’re Mycroft Holmes.”

“I beg your pardon?” Mycroft’s head jerked back from where he’d been watching his mother and Harold walk away together. 

“You have this look on your face like you just heard a dog speak French.”

“It rather feels that way.” Mycroft walked further in to the room leaning on his umbrella. “I do apologize, that was rather rude of me. Unfortunately, too many hours spent in my mother’s company have rather worn me down.”

“I get it.”

“Harold must have told—”

“He didn’t say a word. As far as he’s concerned, I still think you’re his tailor.”

Mycroft was now tilting his head in a perfect echo of his mother’s earlier gesture. 

“Bespoke tailoring pays very well but it rarely means having a chauffeur driven car at your disposal, particularly one where the driver and the man riding shotgun are obviously carrying.”

“But how on earth did you leap from that to believing you know who I am?”

“I’m getting to that. While you were in the Good Head store—”

Mycroft grimaced. “Bonne Tête Boutique, I was picking up a hat for mother.” 

“—I told your driver he’d have to move your car. He told me to ‘bugger off.’ That suggested you were English as why would an American bother to import muscle?”

“Sound reasoning.”

“They weren’t keeping a low enough profile to be worried about New York’s finest asking if they had gun permits which suggested they, or at least you, have diplomatic immunity.”

“I will have to have a word with them.” Something about the slight narrowing of Mycroft’s eyes almost made Reese feel sorry for them. “Please do go on.”

“It would be reasonable to assume that any close relative of Finch’s might be almost as brilliant—”

Mycroft snorted.

“—and Finch introduced your mother as Mrs. Holmes.”

“That still does not entirely explain your theory as to my identity.”

“While drunk off her ass my old CIA handler once told me that the scariest person she’d ever met was a tall, thin Englishman who dressed like a banker and always carried an umbrella. She said he toppled governments on his lunch break, picked his teeth with four star generals and that his name was Mycroft Holmes. At the time I just put it down to the tequila talking.”

“And now?”

“I’ve seen what Finch can do _and_ I’ve met your mother.” 

“I see... How is Harold?”

He could respect Mycroft’s desire to change the subject. “Why do you ask?”

“Mother and I have always worried about him. Harold is somewhat of a dreamer I’m afraid.”

“I’d hardly call him that.”

“He was, before...”

“Before?” He worked on keeping his inquiry casual sounding. 

“Ah, no, Harold will tell you anything he wishes you to know about his past. Suffice it to say that it is not paranoia when you have proof of persecution.” 

They stared at each other. 

“Isn’t this where you say they will have to go through you first, Mr. Reese?”

“Seems like your mother isn’t the only one who’s read comic books but you can stop worrying, I will look after him.” He smirked. “If your mother had proved to be a threat to Finch, the way I first thought she was, I would have shot her without a single qualm.”

“That is a strangely comforting thought.” Mycroft appeared to be biting down on an answering smirk. 

“Quite.” Aunt Violet had re-materialized from the book stacks, a bemused quirk to her lips as she looked backwards and forwards between a shuffle-footed red faced Mycroft and himself. Behind her, he could see Finch trying to control the urge to laugh. 

Perhaps there really was a breach in the space time continuum. There was certainly no other explanation for how they all kept managing to sneak up on him. 

She strode across the room to stand in front of him again, pinning him in place with a pointed look that seemed to see straight through him. She raised a hand to his arm before leaning in to peck him on the cheek, speaking softly so that only he could hear her “sorry about Stanton,” before stepping back and speaking loudly enough for Mycroft and Finch to hear. 

“I am entrusting my nephew to the care of you and that lovely big gun of yours, such a large calibre. I hope you are up to the task.” 

She winked at him before crossing back to Finch to embrace him quickly and to kiss him on the cheek as well.

“Do not forget to stay in touch, Harold, or I shall be back and I will bring Sherlock and _his_ John with me. I am sure Sherlock would find your hobby” he could hear the smirk she was barely suppressing in her voice “almost as amusing as his.”

“It’s always lovely to see _you_ , Aunt.”

Reese noticed the emphasis and decided he’d do some research on Sherlock Holmes. 

“You always were my favourite nephew. Please be careful, Harold.” 

For a moment, he could clearly see the worry on her face before she covered it by pulling a small mirror out of her handbag and patting lightly at non-existent stray hairs. By the time she looked up her face was once again a serene mask. 

“We should be leaving, Mycroft. I fear Mr. Reese needs to lie down before he falls down.”

“Aunt Violet, what we talked about...” Finch was looking anxious again. 

“Do not worry about it, Harold, I promise not to interfere again...” her eyes slid briefly to Reese “in your elections.”

Reese noted her momentary hesitation. Connecting it to her wink and gun-based double entendre, after she had just finished talking to Finch, created a germ of hope in him that perhaps he wasn’t alone after all in what he’d been feeling. If only he could be certain. First, some much needed sleep and then a plan to test the waters. 

Aunt Violet was on the move again, heading back to the hallway. “They really do not need my help to look ridiculous; I just stirred things up a bit.” Her voice floated back down the hallway. “I suppose I will just have to content myself with playing with Cameron... or perhaps the UN, I am in New York after all.” 

“Harold.” Mycroft nodded at Finch. “Mr. Reese, it has been an unexpected pleasure.” Mycroft turned to stride after his rapidly retreating mother. “Mummy, really, why could you not just take up knitting like other people’s mothers do?”

“Do not be ridiculous, Mycroft, who in their right mind would trust me with knitting needles?”

.


End file.
